《智族》(GQ China) MISQUOTES, MISINTERPRETS

(UPDATE July 1, 2010: Chinese translation now available here. Many thanks to my friend, Xiantao, for his assistance.)

My first experience with Chinese language media here in Beijing has turned out to be a mixed bag. The current June 2010 issue of 《智族》(aka: GQ China) has a feature on beer (as well as venues serving beer and showing World Cup matches). I was interviewed for information about beer and about my blog, but what eventually got included into the article was a sidebar with me supposedly offering five “insider tips about drinking beer” (喝啤酒窍门). Alas, tips #2 and #3 contain significant errors or omissions, while #5 is a FALSELY ATTRIBUTED STATEMENT. Here is my attempt to set the record straight.

Tip #2 says: “Chill your glass. When the bartender rinses the glass before pouring the beer, it’s not to clean the glass, but to chill it and prevent the beer from getting warm. Beer is best served between 7 – 10° Celsius.”

This is NOT what I told the reporter! I only remember talking about why beer should be served in a glass and should not consumed directly from the bottle. As I’ve mentioned many times before, the primary reasons are for aroma and appearance. It is NOT for keeping the beer cold. In fact, I usually advocate AGAINST the widespread American habit of serving beer in a frosty cold mug, straight out of the freezer.

That said, perhaps the reporter extrapolated this “tip” from the custom at Belgian beer bars, where the glass is indeed often rinsed prior to serving. In today’s world, I find it debatable that this custom is still meant primarily to keep the beer cold (especially in a modern times where every bar/pub has refrigeration), when perhaps it instead exists simply to assure cleanliness (since Belgian beer bars will usually have a dizzying array of glassware, some of which might very well have been collecting dust).

In any case, while some bars might still claim the main function of rinsing the glass is to maintain a cool serving (and drinking) temperature, it certainly isn’t to “chill” (冰镇 bīngzhèn) the beer. My belief is that in practice most beer today – and ales in particular – are already served too cold . Which brings us to the next problem within this “insider tip”: the suggestion that “beer is best served between 7 – 10° Celsius.”

This temperature range is both potentially too warm for some lagers, and too cold for many ales – including numerous Belgian examples. Some pale lagers can be enjoyed as cold as 6°C (43°F), while many ales are best at temps as high as 13°C (55°F). Instead, there should have been two separate suggestions, with 7 – 10°C for lagers and 10 – 13°C for ales.

(Interestingly, an interview with Susan, the manager of Morel’s, occurs a couple pages before. In it, she gives the proper advice about why one should pour their beer into a glass. Perhaps since this advice was already provided earlier in the feature, the editors decided to mis-attribute tip #2 to me?)

Tip #3 says: “Leave behind 1cm of beer in the bottle. Bottled lagerswill contain yeast sediment, but this does not mean the beer has spoiled. Qualified bartenders will leave behind 1cm of beer in the bottle.”

The most obvious error is a simple editorial mixup in terminology: this issue should primarily concern ALES, not lagers. Even then however, the statement doesn’t consider that bottle sediment usually only occurs in unfiltered or bottle-conditioned beers. Many bottled ales are filtered or force-carbonated without a second fermentation in the bottle. Also, the advice would NOT apply to most wheat beers, such as German hefeweizen and Belgian witbier. Those beers should indeed be served WITH the yeast sediment incorporated into it, and knowledgeable beer servers will do so.

Tip #5: “Adding a raw egg to Guinness helps to give you strength.”

I don’t dispute the existence of this folk remedy, but I don’t remember this ever coming up in my conversations with the reporters, and I certainly do NOT go around advocating the practice. I personally would never do this to any beer of mine. As to why this got added into the sidebar, and why it got attributed to me, I’m a bit baffled.

1 comment to 《智族》(GQ China) MISQUOTES, MISINTERPRETS

I’ve had the same problems with media in China. I’ve had reporters do stories about me brewing beer in Qingdao and they have straight made things up. I speak Chinese and did the interview in Chinese and still had this problem. I knew the media in China was a joke but it’s worse than I originally thought.